"Mama had four kids, but she's a lesbian / Had to pretend so long that she's a thespian," the lyrics go. "Had to hide in the closet, so she medicate / Society shame and the pain was too much to take."

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For Jay-Z, the most painful part was knowing that his mother spent so long living a lie.

"Imagine having to live your life as someone else," he told the host. "And you think you're protecting your kids...For her to sit in front of me and tell me 'I think I love someone' – I mean, I really cried. That's a real story. I cried because I was so happy for her that she was free."

While Jay-Z said he knew about his mother's sexuality, that was the first time they ever spoke about it, as well as "the first time I heard her say she loved her partner. Like, 'I feel like I love somebody.' She said 'I feel like.' She held that little bit back, still. She didn't say 'I'm in love,' she said 'I feel like I love someone.' And I just, I cried. I don't even believe in crying because you're happy. I don't even know what that is. What is that?"

Jay-Z's story echos the account of his mother, who gave her side of the emotional moment in a conversation with the D'USSE Friday podcast back in September.

"Me and my son, we share a lot of information, so I was sitting there and I was telling him one day, I just finally started telling him who I was," she said. "Besides your mother, this is the person that I am, you know? This is the life that I live."